Alex Gets Punished Series  Alternate Scenes
by tilante
Summary: Here, I'm sharing alternate versions of scenes from the Alex Gets Punished series, that I wrote but didn't use.  Spoilers for the AGP stories.  Lots of author commentary.
1. Chapter 1

Here, I'm presenting "alternate scenes" from my _Alex Gets Punished_ (AGP from here on) series of stories. These are fragments - or in some cases, complete chapters - that I wound up rewriting. Each will come with notes on why they were changed.

As such, there are spoilers here for various _AGP-_verse stories. You have been warned.

* * *

First up, we have the original beginning of _The First Time, Take Two_. Like all the _AGP_ stories, this is in third person, but it sticks mostly to Alex's point of view, with us getting Alex's thoughts and feelings, but not Justin's.

I started that way because _AGP_ mostly used Alex as our viewpoint character, and it seemed good to keep consistency. In particular, the ending of _AGP_ was from Alex's point of view, with us not seeing Justin's thoughts, so the reader could experience Alex's surprise and shock on discovering that Justin remembered their night together.

However, while I like to think I usually do a good job of writing Alex, I am male, and because of that, I only have descriptions of what sex is like for women to work from. Since this story was really going to basically be a single sex scene, I had a hard time writing it from Alex's view, which initially motivated the switch to Justin. Secondly, since _AGP_ had primarily been from Alex's view, I decided that writing _TFTTT_ from Justin's view would help differentiate the two stories.

Lastly, I knew from the start - even before I'd decided to actually write _TFTTT_ - that Alex's wish that "any physical damage to or changes in my body resulting" would be undone meant that she'd once again be _virgo intacta _afterwards. (And I also knew that Alex didn't expect that - all she meant that part of the wish to do was prevent her from getting pregnant.)

Now, at this point, Alex already knew that - but Justin didn't. Since this was going to involve a bit of a surprise for Justin, the same reasoning that impelled me to write the last chapter of _AGP_ exclusively from Alex's view applied here, making it simply make more sense for this story to be from Justin's view.

(Careful readers of the series will note that Alex's view is usually the one followed in the stories, with Justin's view sometimes being taken instead. This is deliberate on my part, to imitate the show: the use of third person imitates the external presence of the camera, but the show is definitely centered around Alex first and Justin second, so my stories are as well.)

But enough about viewpoint. Here's the original version of the start. More commentary following.

* * *

1:55. Alex stared at her clock and swallowed. _Two o'clock, he said. And be in my underwear._ _Well, I didn't need to set an alarm - no way I could sleep._ She went to her mirror, looked at herself in it, brushed her hair for what was probably the fiftieth time that night, then looked at the clock again.

1:59. She stared at it, waiting for it to change. _He didn't say what else to do. Just to set my alarm for two, and be in my underwear._ Alex glanced at herself in the mirror again. She'd picked out a pair of blue-and-white bikini-style panties, and a white bra with lace around the edges. She hoped Justin would like them - she thought they were cute, but they weren't what she'd call sexy.

She looked at the clock again. 2:01, it said, and she stood there looking at it and fidgeted. _Should I go to his room? Should I get into the bed? What does he want me to do?_ Alex thought she'd never felt this nervous in her life - the lump in her throat felt like it was the size of a baseball, and she didn't think she could have spoken right then if her life depended on it.

So of course, that was when the door opened. Justin stepped in, silently, then closed the door behind himself and locked it, equally silently. Then he looked his sister up and down, his gaze frankly appraising. Alex started to cover herself with her arms, stopped before they moved more than a few inches, tried to make the gesture look natural by putting her right hand on her left wrist.

Justin took a step forward that brought him just a few inches from Alex. She looked up at her brother's face and swallowed. Usually she could read him like a book, but she'd never seen this - this slight smile, and the almost-hungry look in his eyes. Those eyes raked up and down her again, and Alex blurted out nervously "Is this okay? Is it what you wanted?"

There was no answer - not in words. Instead, Justin placed his hand on his sister's cheek, cupping it with his thumb under her chin. His other hand went to the small of her back, and Justin pulled Alex against him, then brought his mouth down to hers and kissed her. She stiffened as his lips pulled on hers, then put her arms around him and held on.

His thumb pulled on Alex's chin, opening her mouth slightly, and Justin's tongue slid in and gently but firmly probed her. Tingles went up and down Alex's body, and she pressed herself against him more firmly.

A few more seconds passed, then Justin broke the kiss. His hand moved to Alex's hair, and he stroked gently through it.

* * *

So, besides the viewpoint change, this version starts with Justin coming in a little late, instead of early. In this version, Justin coming in late helps to highlight Alex's anticipation and uncertainty... but in the Justin-viewpoint version, we can't see those directly anyway, so he comes in early instead, putting the focus on Justin's eagerness to resume their physical relationship, and the fact that he likes keeping Alex a little off-balance.

The clothing Alex is wearing stays the same - reminding us of Alex's relative innocence and inexperience - and her line "Is this okay? Is this what you wanted?" does as well, since it lets us see her uncertainty in both versions. In this version, though, Justin is silent. My intent was to have him be silent for most of the story, once again keeping focus on Alex's uncertainty about how Justin really feels... but with the viewpoint shifted to Justin, that made no sense any more, so in the final version, Justin starts talking right away.

Since this version never got past the first draft, the description of the action is a bit more sparse than in the final version, but the action itself remains almost the same, with Justin beginning by cupping Alex's chin, his hand on the small of her back, then kissing her. Switching viewpoints also let me throw in the "her lips tasted faintly of strawberries. _Oh. Lip gloss. Right._"

That's a detail from one of my own first kisses. They say to write what you know, and I like throwing in little things like that... and sometimes big things as well. I was glad that the viewpoint switch let me throw that in.

If I'd continued the story from Alex's viewpoint... well, I don't think it would have come out as well, which is why I didn't. It definitely would have been a very different story, with Justin's silence through most of it. It's possible that I wouldn't have come up with Justin giving Alex 'the rules', since I came up with that while giving Justin more to say, and I think that would have been damaging to the series as a whole.


	2. Chapter 2

This time around, we're going back almost to the start - to Chapter Nine of _Alex Gets Punished._ This is the first version of that chapter.

_

* * *

How long can it take Max to get to sleep?_ Alex was sitting on the couch with Justin, watching him out of the corner of her eye. _It must've been twenty minutes since he went to bed._

She swallowed, moved a little closer to Justin on the couch. He looked at her and moved away slightly. "Alex... we're not doing this. If you can't respect how I feel, then..."

"Then what?" Alex asked after a moment. He'd stopped talking, and was looking at her like... _Oh, I think Max must've just fallen asleep._ She scooted closer to him on the couch, and this time, he didn't move away. "Justin?"

"Yes?" He blinked slowly, looking at Alex. They'd been talking about something... something about feelings. He raised his hand and touched her cheek, just barely, as if too much pressure might pop her like a soap bubble.

"Did you want to say something?" Alex looked up into her brother's eyes, searching them.

"I... no. I just... what are you doing here, Alex? My parents are out of town, and I don't think they'd like me having you here this late..."

_Oh my God. A good boy to the end._ But she smiled anyway. She wouldn't really want him changed that much. _Well... maybe a little._ "It's okay. They know I'm here. They're okay with it."

"They are?" Justin blinked, confused, but then smiled.

"But..."

"But what?" He frowned again, lowering his hand and looking at Alex curiously as a grin grew on her face. She turned her head to the side, coquettishly, then spoke again.

"I don't think they'd be okay with this." And she lunged forward, bearing Justin down onto the couch, brought her face down, and kissed him. His hands automatically went to Alex's arms, holding her so she wouldn't fall off, and she smiled into the kiss, a warm happy glow suffusing her as she felt very protected by him.

He kissed her back, lips moving against hers, and Alex felt a moment of surprise as her brother's tongue slid into her mouth. _Where'd he learn to kiss like this? He said Miranda was his first kiss..._ She felt a tinge of jealousy, thinking about Miranda, but it faded quickly. After all - they'd broken up, and now... right now, he was hers. _All mine._

Alex met Justin's tongue with hers, tentatively to start with, then with more firmness as her confidence grew. And then he broke the kiss, and she frowned. "What?"

"Wow," he said, smiling up at her. "I mean... not that I'm complaining, but you're seeming a bit more... intense than usual, tonight."

_Uhhh..._ Alex blinked. _What kind of memories does he have of me right now? What does he think we've already done or haven't done? _She started to feel a bit of panic, wondering if the genie had somehow managed to twist things, but suppressed it. _I can handle this. If I can get Justin to do what I want normally, I can definitely do it when he thinks I'm his girlfriend._

"Well, to tell you the truth," she said, sitting up off of Justin and looking away, "my dad's getting a job in another city."

"What?" Justin sat up as well, very quickly, and moved in against Alex, putting his arms around her. "But... they know we're dating, and... where?"

"LA," she said, putting as much misery as she could into each syllable. She turned then, hugged Justin tightly, burying her face in his neck. "I love you," she said, very quietly. "I mean, like... I _really_ love you. I don't think there's any other guy I'd want. And..." She stopped, pulled back just slightly, staying in her brother's arms, and looked up at him.

"What?" he asked again, more softly this time. He put a hand on her head, ran his fingers through lush, dark hair.

"I want you to be my first, Justin. Your parents are out of town. Mine think I'm staying at a girlfriend's house tonight. I want you."

Justin swallowed, his mouth suddenly dry. "Are... are you sure? I mean, I don't want you to feel like you have to, if you're not ready..."

"I'm ready," she answered quickly, touching her brother's cheek and looking up into his eyes. He opened his mouth to speak again, and she moved forward and kissed him to keep him from making any other arguments. A moment later, she broke the kiss, looked at him again. "My mind's made up, Justin. And you know nothing changes my mind once it's made up. Thank you for trying to be sweet and sensitive, but right now..."

She smiled a little again, then leaned forward and turned her head, putting her mouth by his ear. "Right now, I want you to be big, strong, and bold. I've been a bad, bad girl... and I need a spanking." The last words came out even more quiet, and she was amazed she'd managed to get them out at all.

"You... you want a spanking?" Justin blinked at her, and memories fell into place. Spanking Alex before. The dream he'd had... Something nagged at him, at the corner of his mind, but he dismissed it, looking at Alex, and smiled. "Then a spanking you shall have!"

Justin stood up, lifting Alex with him, putting one arm behind her shoulder, the other under her knees. She giggled at that, but put her arms around his neck. Quickly, he carried her to the stairs, then looked up them and bit his lip. Smiling again, he set Alex on the bottom step, which put them almost eye-to-eye.

He ran his hand through her hair once, twice, then a third time, holding her close against himself with his other arm. "You are so beautiful," he murmured, then kissed Alex, his hand moving to the back of her head, holding her firmly in place as he worked his lips on hers, pulling gently. His other hand rose then, thumb moving to Alex's chin, pulling it down to give his tongue entrance to her mouth.

Alex pressed forward against her brother, letting her arms go around him. _Oh, he feels good. So good._

* * *

As you can see, I got a good ways along writing it like this. But I wasn't really happy with it. Why not?

Well, it felt too quick, for one thing - I felt like more buildup was needed, and that required some kind of action to be taking place before Max fell asleep, unless I wanted to just write Alex sitting there fidgeting and worrying.

So I started it over, starting with Max still being awake. I'm glad I did that, since it gave me a few Max lines to throw in. I realized then that, since I'd had Justin avoiding being alone with Alex, it made more sense for him to keep doing it… and so I had him say he was going to bed too, requiring Alex to do something to keep him up. That led to the laundry room, which let me throw in a Justin moment, with him showing Alex how to properly measure detergent and emphasizing the importance of following the label directions.

We hadn't had a Max moment in three chapters, and I knew I was getting close to the end - and my Justin hadn't really shown any know-it-all tendencies at all, so it was good to get to throw that in.

After that, I started to re-use parts of what I'd written in this first draft. I still felt like Justin, being the straight-up guy he is, would want to make sure that Alex was completely sure that she wanted to have her first time be with him, even believing that she was his girlfriend - thus, she still wound up using the 'my parents are moving and I want you to be my first' speech.

I also decided that that speech was the place to end the chapter… and that it was too good and emotional to waste on a request for a spanking. Thus, the rearrangement to put the spanking first.

Looking back, I do wish I'd worked the bit on the stairs into the posted version… it could have gone at the start of the next chapter. Ah, well - I never claimed to be perfect.


	3. Chapter 3

This time around, I've got a section from Chapter 14 of _Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics_ that didn't work out. This would have gone where the section starting "Hospitals, like any other bureaucracy, work slowly…" is in the final version.

Here it is, commentary afterward:

Chapter 14 - Discarded part for Thursday

Alex and Lexie took turns again, and had one close call when Theresa came looking for Alex while they were pulling their switch, but they managed. Miranda came for the late visiting time, and that was a little awkward, with her not knowing about Alex and Lexie, but it was still good to have her there. Harper came as well, and that made things easier, even though Harper wasn't greatly happy about Miranda being there.

The doctors wanted to keep Justin in the ICU for the rest of the night, then move him to a private room in the morning, once they were sure things were stabilized. They wanted to keep him for several more days after that, but Alex didn't care - once he was in the private room, she could spend the night with him. Okay, so she'd have to sleep in a chair, but... for him, she would. So Alex spent another night with Miranda - this one was a much happier evening, though, and they had popcorn and watched trash TV, talking about how amazingly stupid the people on the shows were.

As it worked out, Justin didn't get moved to his new room until nearly three - and then there were people in and out for a good solid hour, setting up the monitoring machines, talking to him again to make sure he was recovering well, and so on. Of course, by then, it was nearly time that Harper, Max, and Lexie would be getting there.

"Justin - come on, we can tell Max. It's _Max_. He's used to weird. He'll shrug and say something that makes no sense at all, and then he'll realize something more important. Something about food that'll be absolutely disgusting."

"No," Justin said, closing his eyes and shaking his head slowly. "From what you told me, we could have had a disaster with Miranda, if she'd decided to go to the police. And Harper was a close thing too. Look... I'd like him to know too. But now is not the time."

Alex bit back her first retort, and her second, then closed her eyes and breathed out patiently. Then she smiled and squeezed her brother's hand, said, "I'll let you win right now, since I'm so happy you're okay."

"Thanks," Justin said, smiling and squeezing back. He frowned, then pointed to the pitcher of water. "Could you get me some more water, please?"

"Sure," Alex said, setting aside the GED book as she got up. She poured about half a cup, brought it over to Justin, who took it with his left hand, raised it to his lips and sipped slowly. "This is kind of a switch," Alex said then, smiling at him. "Me taking care of you. It's actually sort of fun. But don't get _too_ used to it," she finished with a wink.

Justin handed the empty cup back to her, chuckling a little. "I'll try not to. But -" He cut off as Alex's phone buzzed. She picked it up, looked at the screen for a second, then flipped it open.

"Hey Lexie. Okay, yeah, I can clear out of here by then, and we'll meet up in the bathroom." She giggled, then said, "You know, Mom's going to think you're having a bladder problem soon, if we have to keep this up." She paused, turning half away from Justin as she listened to Lexie, and he took the opportunity to watch her for a few moments.

A moment later she thumbed the call off, then turned to look at Justin, frowned at his gaze. "Do I have something on my face? What are you staring like that for?"

"Because I love you. And because you're beautiful."

She smiled back, said, "Does getting hit by a car always make you this sappy?" Immediately, she held up a hand, said, "Skip that question. We're not getting you hit by another one to find out. Mom, Dad, Max, and Lexie are gonna be here in about ten minutes, so I'm going to have to clear out for a little while." She walked to her brother, leaned down and kissed him softly on the lips, keeping it a surface kiss, but lingering for a moment. Alex pulled back just a few inches, smiled into his eyes, then said, "I love you."

"I love you too," Justin answered, and caressed her face for a moment with his left hand.

So, why didn't I use this? Well, for one thing, I discovered just how expensive the private rooms at the hospital I was using were, so I decided it wasn't reasonable for Justin to be put in one. Secondly, both Harper and Miranda had been let in on the secret in this story, so I decided I didn't want to bring up Max being let in yet.

Most importantly, though, when I wrote this, I didn't feel like I knew where I was going. I was thrashing around, writing little snippets of fluff, and while I enjoy fluff sometimes, I like plot as well. So I backed off and tried to decide where I was going from here, which is when I realized that I wanted to do the 'unlawful wedding'. Once I had a clear idea of what was coming up next, I wanted to make this section shorter, and to get rid of the fluff in it, since the wedding itself was going to be amazingly fluffy.

So this section went, and all that survived from it was a couple of sentences that I reused. The "Mom's going to think you have a bladder problem" and "Does getting hit by a car always make you this sappy?" I liked enough that I considered keeping them, but I didn't. Still not sure if that was a good decision or not… but at this point LDLS was already the longest story I'd written so far, so I decided not to.


	4. Chapter 4

Today, I've got a bit for you guys that didn't make it into _Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics_. This would have been the last dream bit in the dream sequence in Chapter 12.

* * *

The wind ceased. "I'm right here," a quiet voice said, right next to her, and Alex almost jumped, turned to face him. It was Justin all right, but he was dressed in black from his toes to his mandarin-collared neck, even his hands covered in black gloves. He wasn't looking at Alex, but staring ahead, mouth straight and serious, eyebrows faintly contacted with worry. Alex turned to see what he was looking at

- and there was another Justin. This one was in the lair at their parents' home, but all the furniture had been pushed away, off against the walls, and he was stooped in front of a circle, drawn in chalk on the lair's floor, symbols and glyphs drawn in it that Alex didn't recognize, and candles burning at the edges of the circle. To his right, their father lay on the floor, sprawled with his eyes closed, asleep or unconscious or dead, she did not know which.

"What -" Alex started, but Justin-in-black interrupted.

"I've had this dream before. Watch." His hand bumped against Alex's, and then he took it, held on with a tightness that hurt, but Alex simply squeezed back, grateful for the touch.

Justin-in-the-lair stood and started to speak, his lips moving in words that Alex couldn't hear. She noticed then that that Justin looked older, his face thinner, his eyes surrounded by dark circles, like he hadn't slept in days. Still speaking, he took a knife from his pocket, used his thumbnail to pull out the blade, then pushed the tip into the flesh of his thumb, squeezed it against his fingers so that blood dribbled forth, let it drip down onto the floor.

The room shuddered then, somehow without moving, as if the world itself had rippled, and Justin-in-the-lair looked away as some _thing _appeared in the circle, with the body of a man, the head of a rooster, and twin snakes for legs.

"What _is _ that?" Alex asked, blinking at the thing. It spoke to Justin-in-the-lair, the mouth moving, but making no sound that Alex could hear.

"Abraxas," Justin-in-black said. He paused for a moment, licking his lips, then recited, "Abraxas speaketh that hallowed and accursed word, which is life and death at the same time. Abraxas begetteth truth and lying, good and evil, light and darkness in the same word and in the same act. Wherefore is Abraxas terrible." He paused again, swallowed. "That's from the _Seven Sermons to the Dead_."

"So… he's some kind of demon?"

Justin-in-black nodded, still not looking at Alex, and swallowed. "Yeah. Some kind."

Alex looked at him, her expression doubtful. "So… what are you doing summoning him?"

"I don't know." Justin-in-black turned to look at Alex, and she saw his eyes then, and they were stark, glossy black orbs, without white or iris. "I've had this dream many times. But I always wake up before it ends."

* * *

So, some explanation here: my original concept for Justin re-empowering himself was that he would be using demonic magic. This is hinted at in the epilogue to _Fun and Games_, with "the thing he had conjured" and "The hardest part - not the worst, merely the hardest - was cutting his hand" - the 'thing' being the demon (at this point a very minor one, an imp if you will) and the worst part being bargaining with it.

Of course, to get the level of power he would have needed, Justin would have to deal with something much stronger than an imp… thus the foreshadowing above.

Why didn't this go in? I wrestled with it for a day or two, but in the end, I felt uncomfortable tying myself down to something this specific. I still didn't know what Justin was going to wind up fighting, or why. I wasn't sure what the consequences of Justin's dealing with demons would be (well, I had ideas, but they seemed too harsh). And I know the way I write - I have certain points in mind when I start a story, but often, those wind up changing as I write.

So, as much as I liked what I'd written here, I ultimately left it out. I'm glad I did - by the time I made it to the empowerment in _Normal Life_, I had a clear idea of what Justin was going to do, and how the powers he gained would be different from his former wizard powers.

If I'd known I wasn't going to end up using the full empowerment ritual, I would have revealed more in the two times we saw it… but then, hindsight is twenty-twenty.


End file.
